#but for now this is fine

[le-jardin-inculte]

my first experiment with making paper flowers, of course I did something vaguely Trigun-related 😁

[silent-partner-412]

stumbled on a tweet earlier today that essentially said that in games with romance mechanics, “playersexuality” (or the ideas that characters will be into the player character regardless of their gender) is not good queer representation and we should be striving for better. i want to unpack this because even though i largely disagree with their premise, it brings up some interesting ideas.

first of all: “representation”. this has been a buzzword for showing off diverse stories and perspectives from basically any minority group at least since i was a teenager. i think that the purpose of it is noble; we want to see more characters in stories that portray certain identities (in this case queerness) in a way that feels authentic, representative of real life, and not generally adhering to negative stereotypes. i think, at large, this is important to strive for as a creator, but i think some problems have arisen because of how prevalent the word has become within (generally progressive) internet spheres, because a lot of people seem to have different ideas of what “good” representation is. portraying characters one way is bad, because it plays into negative stereotypes, or it’s actually good, because people are complicated and even people of marginalized groups can be bad, etc etc. it’s become exhausting, and i’ve seen stuff i think is portrayed real well be painted as “bad”, or on the other hand, “boring” representation because it’s either too fucked up or too moral or whatever.

i don’t have a definitive stance about what is and isn’t good representation, mostly because i think thinking about it like that is counterproductive. i think it should be more important to consider many factors, like whether or not the character is multi faceted, whether they are in a story that’s focusing on said identity, who the target audience is, and figuring out whether or not the character in question is entertaining, interesting, accurate to life, or whatever else, cuz i think a good (in this case) queer character could be any one of these without necessarily being all of them and still be considered a good character who isn’t just good or bad representation. but that’s a lot of words and just saying good/bad representation is way easier, so it’s likely that we’re just going to keep using the one word and attach it to things we like and don’t like and make judgements about people’s morality if they disagree with you.

anyway, what does “playersexuality” have to do with this? well, the original point that was made is that playersexuality is bad representation, likely because it’s not true to life or very nuanced. which, to be fair, it objectively isn’t. i can’t just go up to any man and assume they’ll be into me, that’s just not how the world works. i don’t think you’re going to have anybody arguing otherwise.

that being said, the purpose of playersexuality isn’t to be real to life. it’s to give more options to a wider variety of people playing the game in question. personally speaking, if i’m told in a game that i have the option to date or marry other characters (especially if it’s a game where this is NOT the main reason i am playing it), i am generally not expecting anything super deep. i probably just want to go for the one i think is the cutest, or the most charming, and live in the little fantasy of them being my boyfriend or husband for a bit before i turn off the game and return to reality. i also am not usually looking for nuanced commentary about sexuality, or anything in that territory. in fact, it’s usually the opposite; i just want a cute little romance with some video game boy and not be constantly reminded that my personal orientation is “other” or the minority because i only have one choice and straight people have 20. playersexuality fulfills that perfectly; i can choose who i want, interact with the shallow game mechanic in the most fulfilling way, and move on with my life.

i’m going to give relevant examples, because these came up in the twitter thread. first of all: stardew valley (which i am currently obsessed with, as you might be able to tell). there are 12 bachelors and bachelorettes, and you can date and eventually marry any of them regardless of your gender. to be quite honest, you’re going to be hard pressed to not find at least one of them to be your type. whether you’re a man, woman, both, neither, gay, straight, bisexual, pansexual, regardless of how you identify it is pretty likely that somebody in this game will appeal to you. and, as it turns out, the game won’t restrict you from going after them! to me, for the type of game stardew is, this is perfect. i can choose the boy i like, i’ll get a couple cute scenes, and then for the rest of my playthrough he’ll repeat the same handful of lines on my farm and essentially be a trophy husband until the end of time. and that’s fine! i don’t need him to be a nuanced portrayal of complex sexuality, this is a game about farming and mining and fishing and all this other cool shit. the fact that my in game husband isn’t great “representation” is perfectly fine in my eyes cuz i don’t need him to be. but, despite this, it was still cited as an example of bad representation because it’s playersexual, and therefore bad.

but like, think about it could’ve been. i’m imagining an alternate universe where, in stardew valley, i can only marry one of the bachelors as a man. what if he’s one i don’t like? i’m not a huge shane fan, he’s a good character but i don’t wanna marry him. if he was my only option, i would be pretty sad about that. same if it was elliot, i know he’s got fans but he’s just not my type at all. if you’re a gay or bi man who like these two, imagine if you could only go after your least favorite bachelor. maybe you find sam annoying, what if he was your only option? what if you don’t like harvey’s mustache or something? what if you thought alex was a douche, or sebastian was too edgy and emo, and you could only marry one of them as a man? wouldn’t that suck? yeah, it’s not like marriage is the deepest part of this game, but it’s still fun. it’s still something i choose to engage with whenever i play stardew. if i couldn’t engage with it how i want, it would sour that whole part of the game for me.

another example: fire emblem engage. this came out earlier this year, and it was the first game in the series to let you (essentially) marry anybody you like, regardless of your avatar’s gender or the gender of the character you go after. this was also criticized in addition to stardew valley in the same thread, and while i have more issues with how it’s handled here, that’s almost entirely due to writing and some strange localization changes (note: i am NOT talking about the stuff with anna being changed. that shit was for the best) that make marriage in this game less than satisfying. but, conceptually, it was fine. i could marry the cute flirty boy in the game, get a shittily written cutscene about our bond being forever, and move on. if nothing else, it was certainly better than other games in the fire emblem series, specifically fates and three houses, which i’ll explain why them not being playersexual was not great.

let’s start with fates. in fates, there are two gay options, one male, and one female. both of them are exclusive to one route, both of them are still options even if you are the opposite sex, and neither of them are probably who most people would probably want out of their marriage candidate (look i am a niles fan but let’s be perfectly honest with ourselves about what kind of person that man is). also, this isn’t entirely relevant, but you’re locked out of in game content if you marry either of these characters as the same gender, which just kinda sucks. i get *why* this is the case, but it still sucks that being gay in this game is, from a gameplay standpoint, objectively worse than being straight.

three houses fares a little better, since marriage does not affect content and there are more options. however, you only get a few options depending on if you’re a man or a woman. this could be a whole other post (if you know, you know. it’s pretty well documented), but to put it lightly, the options fucking suck. once again the romance is not particularly deep, it’s basically just fan service. at this rate, just open up everybody to everybody, playersexuality is easily the better option and i don’t really see how you could see otherwise (and clearly the devs agreed, because that’s pretty much what happened for fire emblem engage).

the common thread of all of this is that, if you’re not going to put in the time to flesh out the characters and make their sexual orientation a focal point of their character (which, if you choose not to, i do not think that’s a bad thing, not everybody is equipped to write about this kinda thing and sometimes a shallow little touch of romance is all that a game needs), just open up everybody’s options. flip the pronouns in the romantic scenes, swap out the art so it can be seen with different gender player characters, do what you need to do. would this be considered “good” representation? maybe not! it’s not true to life or particularly nuanced. but sometimes that’s fine. it’ll make some people like me like your game just a bit more. and if you don’t like playersexuality? great. i get it. there are also many, many, many great stories written by queer people about their experiences as a queer person that delves into the details and nuances of it all. i would say go to those instead if you want “good representation” as opposed to the farming game or the tactical rpg that are just trying to give people options.

[stemmmm]

bad youtube clickbait thumbnail that reads "I think I just had a therapy session with a DEMON???"

[clonerightsagenda]

I was rambling on the issue of museums and human remains and how certain populations are more likely to have their bodies put on display to be gawked at and then went "well I guess the Pompeii casts were of Europeans. there are bones in there right?" and Googled it to make sure, at which point I confirmed that yes there are bones in there, but more interestingly DNA testing revealed that a cast of an adult holding a child everyone assumed was a mother and child were, in fact, a man and a kid entirely unrelated to him. Honestly that's more moving to me. Maybe they were connected in a way other than blood, but maybe a stranger saw a child when the world was ending and thought the one thing he could do was hold them.

[butchfalin]

the funniest meltdown ive ever had was in college when i got so overstimulated that i could Not speak, including over text. one of my friends was trying to talk me through it but i was solely using emojis because they were easier than trying to come up with words so he started using primarily emojis as well just to make things feel balanced. this was not the Most effective strategy... until. he tried to ask me "you okay?" but the way he chose to do that was by sending "👉🏼👌🏼❓" and i was so shocked by suddenly being asked if i was dtf that i was like WHAT???? WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY TO ME?????????? and thus was verbal again

[some-pers0n]

Minecraft movie trailer dropped this thing looks awful my skin itches just looking at these things

[mausolealdrift]

its baffling seeing people on here being all shocked about how other ppl didnt have sex or do drugs or drink or go to parties etc etc in high schools like. sorry i was too busy getting bullied to do all of that stuff i guess. why are you surprised that there’s losers on the cringe loser website

[nipuni]

"I am a higher dimension life form, I am a complex space-time event"

A step by step process of this will be available at my Patreon next month, you can find prints of my work at my Store 😊

[blueskittlesart]

Dear Big Brother

kind of a sequel to this comic

[maeamian]

Part of the reason that Republicans are so desperately acting like they will never lose again is because they are deeply terrified that this is their last real chance to win. The big orange dipshit came in and gutted the party of everyone who wasn't a loyalist, which left it full of nasty little gremlins who have gaping voids where charisma and human decency is supposed to go.

They still hold a lot of power, but if we stop them this year the next presidential election may not be the Most Important One Of Your Life™, that's not a guarantee or anything, but if they don't win here and now their future looks grim, this dipshit is the only guy they have left and he's extremely diminished and has his brains leaking out of his ears at this point. We can beat him into the ground.

So that's what we're gonna fucking do. We're gonna break these fucking fash. They will crash upon us and we're gonna break their fucking necks. When they come for us they will lose because they're fucking losers and we have each other's backs which is something they fundamentally are incapable of comprehending.

[valtsv]

i did actually attend a catholic school as a kid because it was the only school within walking distance and my parents worked all week so they couldn't drop me off elsewhere and while i was there one of the other kids stabbed me through the hand with a pencil during a fight so i guess i'm like. 1/5th stigmatic.

[lazylittledragon]

domesticating your vampire: a memoir

(beautiful high res version on patre0n)

[pigswithwings]

honestly i am such a sucker for machines being cared for. like? please be gentle. i am not like you. this is my body, please be careful. i do not think like you. i do not work like you, or breathe like you. please be kind. please act kindly. you have me in your hands so please, please show mercy. i was made for a purpose, but that purpose was never intimacy. please show me what this is

[quibbs126]

Oh yeah, so I finished it

I mean maybe I’ll make it look prettier but it’s fine as is. Serves its purpose

This has now been simplified in my head as “Transformers One: good ending”

[catmask]

SNAPDEX: DAY 13 | DEX 104

cubert.... warmup for today, 30 minutes

[sarnai4]

(Odysseus steps out of his chambers in Ithaca. Sees a bone.)

Odysseus (scratching his head): That's the sixth one this week. Athena.

Athena (appearing): Yes?

Odysseus: I thought all the suitors were dead.

Athena: They are.

Odysseus (points at the bone): Then do you know who keeps leaving these? Are they a kind of threat or something?

Athena (in realization): Oh, those! No, they're not threats. Those are from Ares.

Odysseus: What?

Athena: He's a fan of yours now. That's how he says he likes you.

Odysseus:...by leaving bones?

Athena: I can call him over here if you want.

Odysseus (quickly): No that's okay--(fails to stop her)

(Ares appears and waves)

Athena (to Ares): He's curious about the bones you keep giving him.

Ares (sadly to Odysseus): You don't like them?

Odysseus (unsurely): N-no, they're great. I just...wanted to know who to thank.

Ares (happily): Good, because I've got more for you!

(A pile of bones drops into Odysseus's arms. Ares waves again and vanishes.)

Odysseus: Do you know why this is his way of showing approval?

Athena: I try not to ask.